Handling Bedwetting When Co-Sleeping

Co-sleeping can be a wonderful blessing for children and parents… but sometimes families have to work around a couple challenges to keep everyone sleeping soundly.

Before I had children, I never would have imagined I’d opt for a family bed. But when Julia was about 5 months old, after weeks of worrying about it, I finally decided to co-sleep.

When Sophia was born, Julia was two and a half and still sleeping in my bed. I worried some more, but decided to figure out a way to make a family bed work.

Since the start, I’d followed all sorts of safety precautions including placing an extra firm king size mattress on the floor and removing any extra bedding and pillows.

But there is an extra wrinkle when three of us share the bed… bedwetting can be extra uncomfortable.

As I mentioned before, Julia regularly wets during the night and if it weren’t for GoodNites® Underwear, I don’t know how we’d make co-sleeping work.

While soon I expect my daughter Julia, who just turned six, to decide to move to her own bed, she doesn’t seem ready yet. And frustratingly, her bladder doesn’t seem to be ready to make it through the night either.

I am so relieved to be parenting in a time where I can connect with thousands of other mothers online who understand and accept that my six year old and my three year old still want to share sleeptime with their Mommy and that my six year old can’t stay dry during the night.

A few nights ago, my three year old, who almost never has nighttime accidents, fell asleep a little ahead of schedule, without fully emptying her bladder, and ended up soaking the sheets. As I dried her off and mopped up the mess, I felt relief that I don’t have to deal with wet sheets every night.

Very soon my little girls will both be in their own rooms, sleeping in their own beds and we’ll hardly remember bedwetting. But until then, I’m glad our family bed stays dry.

Disclaimer – We are working on a paid campaign with GoodNites® Underwear to spread awareness and information about enuresis, also known as bedwetting. I have not been paid to publish positive sentiments about the product.

Comments

While we don’t co-sleep any longer, I definitely understand the frustration of bed wetting. My daughter just turned 4 and has been working hard at wearing underwear to bed but there are accidents here and there. I may have to try these goodnights with her, at the very least it’ll save me extra laundry.

We have never co-slept, but I have no issues with families who do.
I want you to know that I really appreciate the honesty you put into these GoodNites Posts…so many children wet the bed and that’s OK!

I regularly have kids sleeping in bed with us. The youngest three tend to take turns. And while it’s rough to clean up a kid’s wet bed, it is so much worse when the accident happens in MY bed. I totally hear you!

Although I’m not a disposable diaper fan, I appreciate your openness in sharing about co-sleeping, especially with two. So many people seem determined to put their kids off in isolation as soon as possible.

My husband and I still have our middle (just turned six) and youngest (three) in our bed… As you say, the time will come soon enough.

I still have two kids who regularly wet the bed ( son age 9 and daughter age 4 … middle child age 8 does not) and we LOVE good nites. I don’t know what I would do without them. I think my daughter will be able to go without them soon I hope. We are concentrating on helping my son NOT be embarrassed by the fact he still wets the bed. We had our doctor tell him that there are LOTS of kids who wet the bed at his age and that it isn’t a big deal and he will most likely grow out of it in the next few years. Good Nites help reduce the shame he feels. He took one on his recent sleepover and it worked just fine- his friend never knew he was wearing one.

We have co-slept at various times with all three of our kids- my daughter lasted the longest though. Now she sleeps in her own bed beside our bed as a step to her own room. She is just not there yet and I have no issues with her needing to be close!

Oh- and my mom totally coslept with me until I was about 8 or 9. It was just her and I and I needed the comfort. I was an anxious child and she helped me get through that!! I grew out of it and it in NO way affected me negatively.

I too am proud of you for being so open- I will never forget the day when a friend of mine told me she had coslept with her kids. Her kids were older at the time – all well adjusted teenagers- and it was such a relief for me to find SOMEONE who didn’t bash me for letting my kids climb in bed with us!! It was like a huge weight was lifted off my chest just to know I wasn’t the only mom in the world cosleeping!

Thank you for being so honest Susan!! We currently share the bed with my 2 yo son and 6 mo daughter. My 4 yo daughter is in our room – but sleeps in her own daybed. You have a wonderful relationship with your girls, you are so blessed!!

Thanks Annie. How sweet that your whole family shares the room. I really think it helps bonding and let’s the children feel that extra love, security and confidence. Of course it isn’t for every family, but I’m grateful that I’ve had the opportunity to have my girls co-sleep.

I wet the bed well into Elementary school (I want to say I still was when I was 11, but I’m basing that on a vague feeling, and not on any kind of verification with my parents!) And since bed-wetting often runs in families (based on sleeping deeper or something) I fully expected my daughter to as well, but she inexplicably stays dry most nights (but she has night terrors, so our few accidents have been when she was too incoherent to communicate that she needed help getting to the potty.)
I also read somewhere that children given a choice to co-sleep will chose to sleep with parents until age 7, on average (so some stop earlier and some later, obviously.) So both older bed-wetters and older co-sleepers are normal and healthy. 🙂 My daughter decided she’d rather sleep with her plushie menagerie in her big girl bed, rather than with us, a little before age 3. But I still frequently wake up to find she’s moved into our bed over night. Which we’re fine with. We set up baby gates in the hallway at night to block her off from the rest of the house, for safety reasons. And we had to put a nightlight in our room so she can find her way around. But waking up to that smile is SO worth it!

We never co-slept, but once when my little 12 year old son was experiencing a lot of pain from a school sports leg injury, I got in his bed next to him, and held him. It was early in the morning, and I had just walked into my son’s room to check on him. Our family doctor had prescribed a mild pain pill for him to take, and he was encouraged to drink plenty of water. After giving him his pain pill, he removed his pajamas, which seemed to make his leg injury hurt more. I asked him if I could give him a sponge bath since he was naked, and he said okay. Then he looked at me with tears in his eyes, and said that he loved me, and thanked me for taking care of him. This just melted my heart, so I laid next to him in his bed, and hugged him. While I was hugging him, he started to pee. I had to put my hand over his little penis to stop his pee stream from hitting me. My son uncontrollably peed all over my nightie, and his bed sheet. Luckily, I had already put a plastic mattress cover under his bed sheet. Obviously, he had drank a lot of water to the point were he could no longer control his pee. I could have gotten very angry, but this was an accident, and anger wouldn’t have helped anything. I hugged him somemore, and we talked about trying to pee in the toilet. After this big pee accident, I had him wear a diaper at night, until he was no longer bed ridden with his leg injury. When I went into his room early in the morning to check on him, I would usually take a plastic container for him to pee into. He would usually pee a lot in the morning. I feel that loving compassion, patience, and understanding in this situation worked far better than anger. These were trying times, and we worked through this together. Signed: A Wet Mom.

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